We Will Wait: a story of Bellatrix Lestrange
by Lady Lestrange
Summary: Bellatrix Lestrange is sentenced to Azkaban. This strong woman dominated the scene in Dumbledore's pensieve. How did she remain strong until Voldemort freed her? Readers of Harry Potter and the Seers' Truth will gain insight into Ethan and Edward's char
1. Chapter 1

Bellatrix ch1

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We Will Wait

By Lady Lestrange

Disclaimer: The Harry Potter characters and previous situations belong to JK Rowlings. No infringement is meant or implied. No money is made from this Fanfic. THANKS JK.

--LADY LESTRANGE

(A/N: I've written another story on fanfic, entitled HARRY POTTER AND THE SEERS' TRUTH (HPatST). WE WILL WAIT was background for me to understand Lady Lestrange. Since I wrote HPatST BEFORE OotP, I named Lady Lestrange, Valeriana and her husband Desmond. She was written before Bellatrix was published and I can't change her name in HPatST. For those of you who are reading or have read HPatST, and are confused by the name change Valeriana and Bellatrix are the same person as Desmond and Rodolphus are the same person. Her twins, of course, are Ethan and Edward, key characters in HPatST. All other reference are as cannon as I could make them.—Lady Lestrange.) 

Bellatrix Lestrange scratched another mark in the tally on the wall of her cell. She crossed the tallies at seven instead of five so that she could more easily count the weeks. She didn't know why she did that actually. It wasn't like she had anything else to do but count the tallies. She could have counted them over and over again in the years that she'd been here—in fact, she did. Some days she decorated with wiggling lines over them. Sometimes she pretended they were snakes. His snake-- She could almost close her eyes and hear them. Snakes for the special days. But what days were special in Azkaban? The anniversary of her imprisonment, the solstices and equinoxes, All Hallows Eve, Candlemas, the birthday of her Dark Lord, the birthday of her twin sons. 

She had been in Azkaban for twenty-five weeks and one day when her twin sons were born. She never held them. A flash of dark hair and they were gone from her, forever out of her reach. "We will be rewarded. We alone were faithful. We will wait!" She had said it, but it was almost too much to bear. It had been nearly six months and her sister, Narcissa and her husband Lucius had not found the Dark Lord and restored him to his former power. 

Bellatrix Lestrange put her head in her hands and wept. She wondered if they even told her husband that the twin boys were born. She never saw him—never spoke to him. She didn't even know if he was alive or dead. It was not like their marriage was a love match. He was chosen for her, like so many Slytherin marriages, it was an arrangement of good family and money and blood. They were not in love, but they were content. Their goals were similar. She did not want to see him dead. Bellatrix pulled herself to her feet and began to pace her cell. She would not crawl to the Dark Lord when he came for her. She would walk proud, like a Black.

Oh, yes, she had been proud that day in the courtroom. She had known that she was already tried and convicted before the trial even started. What use was it to whine and wail? None. She would not stoop to that level. She was a Black. She remembered Barty Crouch screaming and crying like a baby. Well, truthfully, he was hardly more than a child. She felt sorry for him. His father had no idea of family and loyalty. To allow his own son to be sentenced to this hell was an atrocity. That man did not deserve to breathe the same air as Barty. If she had had a wand, she would have killed him on the spot—no **crucioed **him into oblivion like the Longbottoms. Oh, there was a pleasant memory. She chucked, and suddenly realized that her cell was colder than usual. The demon dementers were lurking. "Go away!" she screamed at them. "I have no soul."

They hovered for a moment more and then disappeared like the wraiths they were. They seemed to believe her. She never held a good thought in her mind for longer than a moment. She prided herself on her ability to shut out everything that was ever good in her life. It was how she survived. She continued pacing.

It wasn't difficult to forget all the good things. Azkaban was set in the middle of the ocean, but the water elemental was absent from it. There was no magic on Azkaban. Contact with the Elementals was impossible. This was the kind of land the muggles created. This was the devastation they were condemning the wizarding world to. She held on to that thought now, like a mantra. She held on to her anger. If only every witch and wizard were subjected to a few moments of time on Azkaban, they would understand why the muggles had to die. They would understand, and there would be no war. They would be in agreement, but the Ministry wouldn't listen. Muggle lovers like Dumbledore wouldn't listen. Damn him. She wanted him dead. 

That was a reason to take the next breath, but when she had first set foot on the rock, she thought she was the one who had died. She wanted to die. She couldn't breathe. She couldn't see. A roaring in her ears caused her to stumble and fall against the dementer than held her. It was worse than a thousand **crucios**. It was vast and void. It was completely empty of magic. It was hell.

"Many pass out when they come to our island," said Rookwood. "The shock of no magic at all is too much for them. By the time they recover, the dementers have had their way with them and they are never the same."

Bellatrix Lestrange scratched another mark in the tally on the wall of her cell. She had been in Azkaban one week and six days, when Rookwood, the miserable worm, came to her to gloat, but Bellatrix did not consider his news bad.

"Your cousin Sirius Black came in today screaming and crying," he told her. "He was transferred from the south tower." Rookwood sneered. "Maybe he didn't like the view."

"My cousin? Sirius?" Was there hope for him after all? She wondered if it was possible he turned to the Dark Lord. That meant they had found the Dark Lord. When? When had this happened? Her tallies had no way of telling her, but hope blossomed in her. Within seconds, the place was swarming with dementers.

Rookwood said the incantation that called them back to Pandora's Box, and for a while, the wraiths were gone.

Bellatrix couldn't get over the thought. My cousin. My cousin Sirius is here in Azkaban? Why? She was not meant to know. She heard nothing of Sirius for months.

As the time came for her twins to be born, she thought less and less about her cousin. She only thought of her babies and held the hope that her Dark Lord would come for them before the babies were born.

"My babies," she whispered. "What will this do to my babies? They can't be born here, in this place, devoid of magic."

The dementers didn't care, and she saw no other witches or wizards until she was in labor—That was twelve years ago, today. Bellatrix Lestrange scratched another mark in the tally on the wall of her cell and became familiar with Rookwood, the worm. Very familiar.

Her mother had brought the children to visit her six times. When they were very young, they seemed not to mind the absence of magic, but by the time they were four, Bellatrix could see their distress. They were afraid. "Teach them, mother. Teach them to be afraid of nothing," she had said. "And mother—Don't bring them here again. I'll see them next at the Dark Lord's side. I can wait."

Carman had nodded her agreement, and took her dark angels away.

Bellatrix Lestrange scratched another mark in the tally on the wall of her cell. She went through her ritual of walking around and across her cell. Step. Step. Step. Each step took her closer to freedom. She practiced every spell she could think of—every one. She was longing for freedom—for a breath of fresh air, the kind that was filled with the air elemental, not this void. Even a window would be pleasant, but there was no window for Bellatrix Lestrange. She was not worthy, so she looked out of her cell into the dirty corridor.

Something was moving—a black shadow. At first she thought it was a dementer and cringed, steeling herself against the frigid emptiness, but it was no dementer. It was a black dog. He walked on silent feet past her cell. He did not look at her, did not acknowledge her.

"Sirius," she whispered, snaking her fingers through the bars to touch his fur. "Remember me." Several of his black dog hairs stuck to her fingers as he walked on. For a long time, she held the hairs wondering if he would help her. If Sirius had indeed turned to the Dark Lord, then the twelve years passing told her that the Dark Lord was vanquished yet again while she waited in this prison. If Sirius was innocent of his crimes, then he was still on the side of Dumbledore. Would he even remember her if he came to freedom?

She clutched the hairs and wished him success. He would remember her. She was family.

Bellatrix Lestrange scratched another mark in the tally on the wall of her cell. She stood in the center of her cell and closed her eyes, remembering the dizzying feeling of apparition. She kept her eyes closed imagining being home with her boys. She imagined being summoned to Him--going to him--kissing his robes.

She was standing with her eyes closed when she heard Rookwood.

"Bellatrix? Bella, my beautiful—"He chuckled. "Not beautiful anymore." She kept her eyes closed, still imagining her Dark Lord, but it was not him who spoke. It was Rookwood, the worm. "I've brought you a gift."

She opened her eyes. Rookwood's gifts were never without cost. He held out a bar of soap. It was sweet smelling as some sort of flowers—Hyacinth, she decided. Over the years, Rookwood had brought her many gifts—clean robes, soaps and toothpaste, a brush, warm socks—and all of them she had paid for—paid dearly.

She reached for the soap. 

"Not so fast," he said snatching it out of her grasp. "You are no longer the queen of Dark Magic. Your Lord is dead and gone, and you will rot here until you die. I control every good thing you have. Say it!"

"You are my lord," she said listlessly. "I am not a queen of anything. I am nothing but a house elf—"

"Ah—you are half dead. Perhaps I should find another to give the soap to—"

"No! Please!"

"That's it. Beg," he demanded.

And she did beg, thinking all the while that if the Dark Lord ever came for her, the first thing she was going to do was get even with this worm. She fantasized about which **crucio** she would use—how many—until she finally allowed the spell its free rein and then he would die—slowly—painfully.

Bellatrix Lestrange scratched another mark in the tally on the wall of her cell. She was quite sure that today was May 4, Ethan and Edward's birthday. They would be thirteen. It was a magical year. For a moment she was hit with such an intense longing that she nearly sobbed aloud. She had never held them to her breast. She had never cuddled them or taught them their first spells. She never saw them ride a broomstick or dabble in wandless magic. She had missed their entire childhood, and now they were young men. 

Thirteen. The age of her own awakening. She wondered what new magic would appear for them, now that they were adolescents. As she thought of it, she had a moment of panic. She couldn't remember what it felt like—magic. It had been so long since she held magic in her hands and felt its power. So terribly long.

She put her face in her hands and sobbed. No one was here to see her. It was OK if she broke down just for a moment. She was nothing but a mass of pain and sadness. She was an animal. No. No she wasn't. She was Bellatrix Lestrange. She was a witch. She was a woman of power. She threw her head back and howled, an animal cry for an animal in a cage. "We will wait," she screamed. "WE WILL WAIT!" and someone down the row began to bang on the cell. Bang. Bang. Bang. The rhythmic pulses touched some cord in her as she remembered the spells—Bang. Bang. Bang. Knocking down a muggle's door. She remembered the screams. They were so alive the miserable little monsters—stealing our magic. **Crucio! Crucio! Crucio!**

Of course, the spell didn't work here in this hellhole--this place of desolation, but she needed the spell to work. She needed the magic with every fiber of her being, and he wasn't coming. He wasn't coming for them. He had forgotten them. They were faithful, but He had forgotten them all. Despair sank into her soul.

****

Crucio, she muttered into her hands, and then she brought her teeth together on the flesh between her thumb and forefinger. As she gritted her teeth—they had to meet—She forced them together through her flesh. She muttered **Crucio!** And tasted blood. 

Yes, she was still alive. Still waiting. Still Bellatrix Lestrange. 

After a moment, her hand was numb, the pain dissipating. She pulled her teeth apart and bit again, grinding her teeth together to feel the pain and then she knew that she was alive.

"I will wait," she muttered. "I know, I shouldn't have doubted you, my Lord. I will stop my doubting. I will—It is so hard to wait—I can't. I'm weak," She sobbed, and sunk her teeth viscously into the flesh of her hand.

****

"Crucio!" she muttered. Bellatrix hands were as scared and furrowed as the Dark Lord's from her self-inflicted wounds. Her body was scarred, but her mind was still sharp. She abhorred the weakness of her cellmates who whined and cried for pity when there was none. She would remain strong. She would remain faithful. She would be ready when he called her. 

She got up and began pacing her cell—five steps across, four steps wide, seven steps diagonally. Seven was a good number—the number of completion. She would complete this task. Back and forth. Back and forth. As she paced, she mentally tallied off the spells her sons should know by now; she listed the ingredients in polyjuice potion, and veraxis and veritaserium. She struggled to remember the differing markings of various adders. She used to know that. It was imperative that she remember. At last it came to her, but she wasn't sure. She fretted over it endlessly. She had to be sure—almost sure. She listed the enchantments to make a portkey if it activated on touch and if it activated at a certain time and if it activated by a certain event. 

She had finished her daily ritual of pacing and listing earlier that day. She brushed her filthy hair and spent another hour picking lice out of it. She cracked each of them beneath her dirty fingernails, saying **crucio,** and remembering how she had practiced that spell on bugs with Carman, her mother. She had been ten. "You must know this before you go to Hogwarts," Carman had insisted. "You will be sorted into Slytherin and you must be able to fight for your place in the heirarchy."

****

"Crucio!" she said crushing another louse.

A sudden searing pain in her arm took her by surprise. She almost didn't recognize it. The feeling was so foreign in this place of non-magic. It was Magic. It was her Dark Mark, burning black. It was His magic inside of her—His Mark, sent by Barty Crouch. Barty Crouch! How could that be? How did he escape and she was still rotting here? How? How? How? Then, suddenly it didn't matter. It only mattered that his people were moving again. His Death Eaters were gathering. He would rise, and she would be waiting.

She longed to apparate to the Mark, but she was denied that pleasure. Instead, she began to bang on the cell doors. "He will rise!" she yelled, feeling the swell of hope within her. "He will rise!" 

Others took up the call, and suddenly, the place was swarming with dementers. 

"Shut up!" sneered Rookwood, and she looked at him aghast. "You felt his Mark burn!" she said "and you still turn the dementers on us? Traitor!"

"It wasn't Him," shouted Rookwood. "It was Barmy Barty. The Dark Lord is dead. He is not coming back. It was in the prophecy—a babe shall lay him low. Have you seen your Mark before now?"

"No," she whispered, hope dying as the dementers swarmed. She felt their cold mouths—sucking--sucking—Once she would have screamed for Rookwood to put them back in their box, but now, she already felt empty. How could they suck anything from her? There was nothing left.

Bellatrix Lestrange scratched another mark in the tally on the wall of her cell. She pushed the tattered remains of her robes' sleeve out of her way as she marked the tally. Something on her skin caught her eye. It was her Dark Mark. She could make out the outline of the skull. Two weeks later, she could see the snake. Three weeks later, she could make out the individual scales on the snake's back. He was not dead. He would be back for them—for her. "I will wait," she muttered. "I must—"

Bellatrix Lestrange scratched another mark in the tally on the wall of her cell—tally after tally after tally and each day there was no news of Him. Each day she checked her Mark, looking for tale-tale signs of his life in it. She memorized every scale of the snake, every furrow of the skull. She traced its shape with her finger, a finger covered in filth. She must not be like this when He comes. She must be ready. Once she was beautiful, but now, gaunt, dirty, disillusioned, she was no longer beautiful. She stood and began to pace. She may not be able to attain beauty, but at least she would not be covered with filth. She had made up her mind. She had a plan.

When next she saw Rookwood, she begged him for water, for soap, for clean robes—"You are the only reason this place is bearable—" She made herself say the word—the word that was reserved only for her Dark Lord—"You are the only reason this place is bearable---Master."

He smiled at her. 

"You were right," she said. "It's been months since Barty Crouch sent the Dark Mark. Our Dark Lord--He's not coming back, is He?"

"I don't know," said Rookwood eyeing the shadowy form of his own Dark Mark. "The Mark's been getting darker and darker—Still—" He shrugged. "I guess I might be able to find some soap—"

Nearly nine months later, Bellatrix marked off another tally, June twenty –third. Her hands were as clean as she could get them. Her hair was combed. It was evening. The day was almost finished when the Mark burned. This time, she knew, it was He. She felt his magic. She felt his power. It hurt, but the pain was welcomed. It was a good sort of pain—the pain of belonging—the pain of at last finding him. She didn't want it to end. It was hope. It was freedom. It was ecstasy. He was alive.

She sucked in her breath, laying her right hand against the Mark, letting the heat burn into her right hand as well as her left arm. She wanted to hold on to it—to keep it. She wanted desperately to hold the magic inside of herself, but too soon it was fading. She put her mouth against the Mark and sucked gently, tasting the hot, Dark Magic. Soon, she crooned to herself. Soon. Soon. And when it was completely gone, the pain only a memory, she stood and began banging on her cell. "The Dark Lord is risen!" she screamed. "He is calling the faithful! He will come for us! Who has felt his power?"

The chant echoed through the cells as others picked up the chant. 

There were no dementers this day, coming to suck away their hope. Rookwood kept them in their box. Rookwood himself did not venture into the cell area until much later and Bellatrix knew why. He was afraid.

"My sons," she thought as she rocked herself on the cold, stone floor. "My sons have done this. They have succeeded where others have failed. They are thirteen. Young men. Powerful wizards. She knew it was so even though she never saw them do magic. She closed her eyes and remembered their curly dark hair so like her own. Edward, a little smaller than Ethan, but both tiny dark angels at age four, when she last saw them—nine years ago. She wondered if their own Dark Marks burned on their arms. How did they take the pain? Did they understand how important it was to suffer for a cause greater than yourself? Did they understand the Mark linked them to that very cause? 

It was hard to imagine how they had grown. Would they wear their hair long or short? Would they both still have her eyes—eyes that gave away nothing? Would they be tall like their father? She thought briefly of Rodolphus and realized that she couldn't remember his face. She could only remember that he was tall and had long, steady fingers, like the Dark Lord's. Why could she not remember his face? She could remember the face of the Dark Lord—and more than that—she could remember his magic. Soon she would see Him. Soon she would see her sons. She fingered the still sensitive tattoo, thinking of her sons—thinking of Him."

Bellatrix Lestrange scratched another mark in the tally on the wall of her cell. It was easier now that she knew he was alive. He would come. He had to come. She was faithful. 

Bellatrix Lestrange scratched another mark in the tally on the wall of her cell, and another and another. Why did he not come? Didn't he know that Azkaban held those still faithful? Didn't he know they would still support him?

Bellatrix Lestrange scratched another mark in the tally on the wall of her cell. It was September 1. She paced with greater vigor. He must be coming soon. He would find her ready. The day was nearly over when her Dark Mark burned black. She cried out, holding her arm close, but not because of the pain. The pain was nothing. This was hope. 

She felt His Magic burning stronger than ever—hot and ferocious—and the Mark sent by—she cradled her arm like a newborn child. The Mark was sent by her eldest son—yes! Oh yes! Tears coursed down her face, and the dementers swarmed upon her, feeding upon her hope, but even they could not take it away from her. 

=

For more about this Bellatrix Lestrange, and her sons, read HARRY POTTER AND THE SEERS' TRUTH ?storyid=1130559


	2. Chapter 2

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We Will Wait: A Story of Bellatrix Lestrange

By Lady Lestange

Chapter 2

Disclaimer: The Harry Potter characters and previous situations belong to JK Rowlings. No infringement is meant or implied. No money is made from this Fanfic. THANKS JK.

--LADY LESTRANGE

(A/N: I've written another story on fanfic, entitled HARRY POTTER AND THE SEERS' TRUTH (HPatST). WE WILL WAIT was background for me to understand Lady Lestrange. Since I wrote HPatST BEFORE OotP, I named Lady Lestrange, Valeriana. She was written before Bellatrix was published and I can't change her name in HPatST. For those of you who are reading or have read HPatST, and are confused by the name change Valeriana and Bellatrix are the same person. Her twins, of course, are Ethan and Edward, key characters in HPatST. All other reference are as cannon as I could make them.—Lady Lestrange.) 

==

It was a day, like any other day, a night like any other night. Bellatrix scratched a tally in the cold stone. Another day, another tally. It didn't matter. He didn't come. She waited through the night because night was His time. Night was when there was some possibility of feeling the Mark, but it didn't come.

Another day passed and another and another. They ran together. She wondered why she ever thought that she should debase herself so much as to beg Rookwood for soap and water. That foul thing. He should have been in a cell beside hers. He was a guilty as she was, but. If she and Narcissa had been allowed in the same courtroom together wouldn't they have found a way to force the judges to free them? It all came down to money and influence in the end. She had too little of both. Of course, silver-tongued Lucius could have done it if he wanted to, but he never liked her. She wasn't pretty enough to suit him. But, he did it for her sister. Bellatrix was not so stupid as to think that Narcissa got out of coming to Azkaban on her own. No. It was Malfoy money and Malfoy charm that bought her freedom. So why was she condemned to rot here? She was family. Shouldn't they have her out by now? She scratched another mark on the wall.

Why did her Dark Lord not come! It was time. He had plenty of time since September first. He should be planning. She should be planning at his side—tasting and feeling his magic. At His side. She could almost make herself feel it. She willed herself to remember. She had to remember. She could not forget the feel of his magic. A passing thought nagged at her. She had forgotten Rodolphus. She had forgotten her husband's magic. She squelched the thought with her iron will. It did not matter. Only the Dark Lord mattered. 

That night, she prayed. She had not prayed for many years. All the gods and goddesses had abandoned her. "Like He abandoned her," a little traitorous voice taunted. "No! She shouted. "He will come for us!" She waited for the echo of the other prisoners taking up the cry, but they were silent. "He will come!" She shouted, once twice, a hundred times. "We must be faithful."  


"Fuck faithful!" growled a fellow inmate, and Bellatrix finally grew silent, and hot salty tears coursed down her face. Tears, she thought. Hadn't she cried enough? It accomplished nothing—but it must. It must have purpose. She must have purpose.

List every potion that you can remember in which tears is an ingredient, she told herself. She remembered one hundred and five of them. Eighty-nine she had brewed herself including the love potion that caused Rodolphus to fall in love with her at Hogsmeade so long ago. Rodolphus Lestrange. For just a moment his face swam before her eyes and she remembered—She remembered his face, but not his magic.

She was in her sixth year at Hogwarts and Bellatrix was living to the fullest. She had met Rodolphus Lestrange, two years her senior, at a Malfoy party and he had met her at Hogsmeade the following weekend. Bellatrix knew her parents had spoken to the Malfoy's about allying themselves with the Malfoy clan. It didn't matter which sister-married Lucius. Personally Bellatrix thought him a little too pretty for her tastes, but when Laurel decreed that it was time to marry a Ravenclaw and went after Marshall Avery with claws bared, the choice was down to the two of them. She never thought that Narcissa could think of anyone besides herself, but she had tearfully admitted to her sister that she was pregnant, and the child was Lucius'. Bellatrix shrugged. The Malfoy money and the Malfoy name would have been nice, but it wasn't something she couldn't live without. When her mother asked her why she was distancing herself from Lucius, she couldn't betray her sister's trust. It wasn't that she cared about keeping the secret so much, as it would drive a wedge between their magic, and she wasn't about to cease to share magic with her sisters. It was what she lived for.

Bellatrix paused remembering, the complex and beautiful spells they formed together and abruptly caught herself. Keep thinking along those lines, and you'll have the whole colony of dementers down upon you, she thought. She had told her parents quite truthfully, that she wasn't ready for marriage. But she was a Black and from a long line of purebloods. And her parents weren't ready for that truth. 

Bellatrix met Rodolphus again and again. They played so many pranks on Gryffindors and muggles that they lost count. Some of them were harmless, most were not. Their secret meetings intoxicated her. He was fun and funny and powerful. He told her he was a Death Eater, high in Voldemort's regard, and she believed him. He was used to following orders, hers as well as Voldemort's. Sometime he sometimes left her abruptly alone in the middle of their secret meetings, but he never left her bored. Finally, she refused to be left behind. She coaxed and cursed alternately until he grudgingly agreed for her to go with him killing aurors and muggles alike. She knew she could convince him and after a while, the salty tang of blood was better than the aphrodisiac she had brewed.

Finally, he took her with him to Lord Voldemort. The pain of the Dark Mark was unexpected, but once she touched his magic, she was transformed. It was pure power, and nothing else would suffice. She could take the pain as long as she had the magic too. She so needed the magic now. Tears streamed down her face in hot bitter tracks. She had so much, and now she had nothing. She even had to struggle to remember his magic, but she wouldn't let it be lost. Never.

She put her mouth over her mark, trying to taste some remnant of the magic in her mouth, and she wept because there was nothing there but a vague tattoo, which was slowly growing darker. Then without warning the Mark fired in her mouth and she tasted his magic exploding into her mouth, but not just his. It was sent by a woman—a girl really—a Weasley Bellatrix thought with surprise. She must be mistaken. The sign of the Mark was too powerful for a mere Weasley and it tasted of him. She pondered this long and hard. How could it happen? Were they sharing magic? Sharing sex? Perhaps she had just received the Mark and had not yet assimilated his magic. That seemed most likely. She realized that she had let the moment of fury pass her. The magic was gone and all was silent. No one had clamored from the cells "We are faithful! We will wait." The infinite silence returned only to be broken by an occasional moan or sob.

Bellatrix's mind went back to its wanderings. When he said, "Blood and magic mingled. You are mine." She believed him. She believed him with her whole heart and her whole soul. She knew he was right. She was his. The thought brought a feeling of satisfaction that she once may have labeled as joy, and she looked around anxiously for the dementers, but they were no where in sight at the moment. Maybe Rookwood had them in their box. Nonethelesss, she curbed her emotions.

"Her parents were looking for a husband for her, now that Lucius was so obviously enamoured of her sister, but she didn't want anyone else. If she couldn't have the Dark Lord himself, she wouldn't marry at all," she told her parents. 

Even in memory, Bellatrix shuddered. Never had Carman's crucio been more vicious. "Well, if he was going to live forever, and his women weren't—" she had said—

Another curcio more vicious than the first struck her.

She didn't know how she returned to Hogwarts but she spent the week in the hospital wing. Trembling she imagined herself there now. She ached with almost as much pain, but the pain was mental: the pain of betrayal and loss. She was sure that Madame Pomfrey understood that what she was feeling were the residual effects of the crucio so long ago, but she decided to keep quiet about it. Bellatrix worried about Dumbledore knowing the curse came from her mother. What would he do to her parents if he believed they were abusive? She repented her actions. She was wrong. She should marry whomever they chose. She would still belong to the Dark Lord. Nothing would alter that she thought as she fingered the Mark. She sent her parents an owl and later that night, told Rodolphus of her decision. Here in this place devoid of magic, she touched her Mark and remembered and she marked another tally on the wall.

She had already laid her head down and closed her eyes. She heard the scratch scratch of the rats nearby, It had been a wonderful day. She knew he was alive. He was moving toward something. Three Marks within a month of each other—and then the burning stuck her left arm.

Another Mark had been sent. She was on her feet, desperate to go to him. The longing to apparate burned hotter than the Mark. "He's coming," she whispered. Over and over again, she simply whispered, "He's coming!" The sound echoed like a mantra through the facility. There were no dementers to bother them because Rookwood had gone to bed. She stayed wide awake throughout the night, marveling. There were two Dark Marks in one place within just a few hours of each other. There could be no doubt. He was moving.

==

"Do you know who your parents have chosen for you?" Rodolphus had asked..

"No."

"I have done a –task--a favor for Lord Voldemort," said Rodolphus. "He has asked me several times what I wish as my reward." He had moved his lips to her ear. "I would like to ask for you."

She remembered the moment so well. She had assessed his proposal. He was powerful and exciting. He was of her blood and position and they got along well together, which she supposed translated to, he did not think he could control her. 

He was still looking at her, his voice low and even, he said, "We like the same things, crave the same excitement. I intend to be at his right hand."

She nodded, but with one correction. It would be her at Lord Voldemort's right hand, not him. She smiled and said "yes". His magic flowed into her hot and sweet. She remembered the moment, but not the magic. Not in this place of death. 

Rodolphus was her choice—hers and Lord Voldemort's. 

She closed her eyes and imagined his hands on her body. She pretended she was young and beautiful and desirable and a sudden chilling cold invaded her cell. The black things came sensing a bit of happiness within her.

"Rookwood,," she screeched. "Get them off of me." 

"You looked positively wanton," he said. "The wanton skeleton. If the Dark Lord ever comes, he won't come for you. He will bury you, mistaking you for a dead muggle."

"Rookwood!" 

  
They won't harm me as long as I touch their box," smirked Rookwood 

"Rookwood!"

Bellatrix was not so lucky. The dementers were swarming now. The only reason she hadn't been kissed is because there were too many and they were crowding one another.

Rookwood stepped into her cell and locked the door behind him. "Life and death in one cell," he said pulling her close to him. "The only question is, I'm not sure which is which." Still holding the box, lowered his head to kiss her mouth. "Call me master," he said.

As his lips met hers, she wasn't sure his kiss was any better than the demanders. The eternal cold still lingered at her back. They crowded close, anxious to feed on her powerful feelings. With their cold maw at her neck and Rookwood's hot one at her lips, Bellatrix wondered how she had ever sunk so low. She wished for a knife to plunge into his heart. 

She remembered Dumbledore teaching her. Dumbledore exasperated. 

"Transfigure the mouse into a water goblet." 

She had transfigured it into a dagger. 

"Transfigure the guinea fowl into a crystal bowl."

She had transfigured it into a razor sharp stiletto, the bird's beady eyes still blinking in surprise, but the blade was wicked sharp and perfectly made. She liked knives. She rubbed her hands against Rookwood's chest, wanting the knife. Anywhere but here, she would have had it.

She felt his heart's fast even beating and she fantasized about it racing in fear of her, his whiny voice pleading and finally his warm blood spilling over her hands and she realized that she was for once far away from Axkaban. She bit down on the tongue in her mouth and tasted the metallic tang of blood. It tasted wonderful, and for one brief moment, life was good. She was fulfilled.

"You bitch!" Rookwood hauled back and struck her hard across the face. Her own blood mingled with his in her mouth. "You damned near bit my tongue off," he complained. 

She raised her head a little higher, still clinging to him to protect herself from the dementers that were now in ecstasy, feeding on their high emotions.

"He will come for us," she said, "for me," she whispered, and Rookwood left her in disgust, but he took the demnters with him. The house elves didn't bring her any dinner that night, but it didn't matter. She wanted to savor the taste of his blood in her mouth. It was almost as good as magic. 

No it wasn't, she argued with herself. "You have forgotten what magic tastes like, and that's why you are so willing to accept this meager substitution. Nothing tastes like magic. Nothing. Disgusted, she spat the blood out of her mouth on the cell floor. The starving rats came to feast on it. She marked another tally on the wall.

.

If he didn't come soon, there would be nothing of her to rescue, she thought. Whimpers and cries echoed through the darkened halls. "He will come and woe to you who were not faithful!" she shouted.

"Shut up Looney Lestrange," muttered Rookwood, "Or I'll set the dementers on you."

"I will see you in hell," she said, her eyes burning with malice. "She needed to curse something—anything. She needed to feel her power."

She marked another tally on the wall.

"So what to you want today, Bella. Some shampoo? Your hair is looking pretty ratty."

"A rat," she said. "Yes, that's it."

"A rat? You know you are as crazy as the loons in St. Mongos?" Why would you want a rat? I imagine you live with enough of them in here."

She raised her head a little higher, but didn't answer him.  
  
"Ok," he laughed. "A rat it is." He touched her slimy dirty skin at her neck and said, "a rat and some soap. I want my woman cleaner than you are."

"I am not your woman," she said regally.

"I know," he smirked. "You are the Queen of Dark Magic.  


"I am, " she agreed. "Someday you will know it."

He laughed at her and sent her soap and water. He did not send her a rat. When he came to her later that night, she wondered briefly what Rodolphus would think of her giving in to him—selling herself to him for a few little comforts. Rodolphus would understand survival, she thought She waited for another chance to bite him, but he didn't kiss her.

In the end, she caught one of the cell rats, by trapping it under the leggings Rookwood had given her last week. She wrapped the cloth around the rat's neck and slowly, ever so slowly strangled it, feeling its struggles. Crucio! She whispered. Crucio! Crucio! Crucio! She pretended that the suffering animal was Rookwood. 

For just a moment she pretended it was The Dark Lord who had abandoned her, but then she realized what she was doing. How drastically she was betraying him, and she thrust her arm into the crazed rat's mouth. It bit down with a vengeance and she dropped it, her prey scampering away into a crack in the wall.

Two days later, her arm had swelled to three times its size and she was too sick to remain in her cell. She was taken to the infirmary to be healed. Ironic, she thought. Heal me, so that I can die a little bit at a time. That was exactly what she wanted to do with the rat. If she strangled it gently and carefully enough, she could revive it even without magic. Her own breath would be sufficient to revive it, but she had lost it. She didn't know how many days she was in the infirmary. Frantic, as they led her back to her cell, she realized she would lose track of her tallies. 

"What day is it?" she begged first the medi-witch and then the guard.

"What difference does it make?" he asked "You're going to be here till you die, Bellatrix."

"I have to know. Please. Have pity. I want to remember my children's birthday. The day I first pulled magic from the elements. The day I met—my—my husband."

"All right. All right," agreed the guard. "It's October 31. Halloween." An alarm when off at his belt and he frowned.

Bellatrix sucked in her breath. "It's Halloween? Tonight?"

"Yes," said the guard and I get off duty in five minutes to go spend the holiday with my family," he said as he reset the wards and protections on her cell. "I hope this alarm isn't anything that makes me have to stay over time."  


Bellatrix watched him go. 

She knew the day with every drop of magic that had ever been in her. It was All Hallow's Eve. It was a night of celebration: a night of spells and revelry. It was the night her Dark Lord was taken from her. It was the night Laurel died.. She felt the void of her sister in the pit of her gut. Sometimes, it seemed that void was the only thing there anymore. There was nothing else. Nothing really to live for. Nothing to die for either. She paced the cell feeling unaccountably depressed.

She wished she could spend Halloween with her family. She wished so hard that she knew she knew in any air but Azkaban's, it would have become a reality. What were they doing on Halloween," she thought "What were they doing," and for the first time in her life, she knew exactly what they were doing. They were with her. Bellatrix was stunned into silence.

==

"Bellatrix," whispered Narcissa. "Sister!" and the little group became silent, but Bellatrix did not speak. She didn't want to disturb the wondrous mirage in front of her.

Lucius moved back a step with their son, nearly grown now, his white blonde hair like both his father and mother's. They allowed Carman to step closer to the cell. Narcissa threaded her hand through the bars and gripped her sister's hand. A whiff of magic passed through her fingers as her dead sister's husband struggled to open her cell. It was so fleeting so guarded, that Bellatrix was not sure she felt it. This was her sister. Memories of the times they had shared magic coursed through her. They had brought down buildings together. They had moved mountains. She felt the void that was Laurel and realized that Narcissa felt it more acutely. She was not used to the void.

"This one's a bit more complicated," Laurel's husband said as he worked on the lock of her cell. "You must have given them more trouble than most-Bellatrix."

"Of course," she said her voice low and rasping. It bothered her for a moment that she couldn't remember his name. He was a Ravenclaw. That much she remembered. A Ravenclaw with her Lord, for she had no doubt that her Dark Lord was here. Somewhere. Her heart was leaping in her chest. She must be dreaming again. Some of the elation left her. Of course it was a dream. It had to be. Did she really believe he would come for them? Why? They were not worth his time. She realized that now. 

Where were the dementers? She wondered, looking fertilely over her shoulder, but they were no where in sight. Of course not, her joy was tempered by the realization that it had to be a dream. It was a nice dream, but a dream nonetheless. Another child was with them; a girl and Bellatrix remembered her sister Narcissa had also been pregnant when they had made the Longbottoms squirm. Was this her child? The child looked like neither her pale blonde sister nor the tall charming Lucius. The child, in truth, looked like a Weasley, but of course, that couldn't be—Well, dreams sometimes go off on strange tangents, she thought. 

Is she yours" Bellatrix asked of her sister Narcissa but Narcissa choked and shook her head. "No. Our girl child is no more."

"Dead," thought Bellatrix. "Narcissa had given birth to a squb and it was dead. Dead by Longbottom's curse, and she remembered the night—The night that brought the Longbottom's to St. Mongo's and her to this hell and her sister's child to death--dead. How could a night with such promise end so disastrously?

She pushed the thought away. As long as she was dreaming, she had some choice over the dream, didn't she? So why think of the asshole aurors. Why think of Narcissa's dead squib?

So unlike her dark angels. A slow smile stretched across her face. Her children were alive and powerful. As long as she was dreaming, thought Bellatrix, she might as well see her sons. Belllatrix looked for them, her mind playing tricks on her. She was still imagining them at four years old, but though their faces were not recognizable, she recognized their magic. Her eyes settled on the two dark twins in front of her and she embraced them together, feeling their magic—the first magic she had felt in fifteen years. She nearly wept. What an awesome dream that would allow her to feel magic. She must be remembering, but what a remembrance! She buried her face in their hair like she had done when they were babies on her knee. The smell of their magic was so familiar. It was hers. Her magic and Rodolphus' mixed, but Ethan was more like her. She could smell the fire on him like a smoldering pit of magic. She could taste it, like she had tasted the Dark Mark he had sent one month and thirty days ago. "You," she said softly. "You sent the Dark Mark into the sky on September 1. My firstborn. My Ethan. And my Edward." The freshness of water and air was upon him. So compatible, she thought. So awesome together. She wondered if they had shared a spell yet, and remembered how jealously Carman guarded that secret when she and her sisters were young, but still, she smirked. They had found out. She had no doubt her sons would too.

Everything she had been musing upon was erased by His presence. She could barely breathe. She wanted to fall to her knees and kiss his robes. She wanted to curse him and rail at him for taking so long that she thought she was abandoned, but she looked into his eyes she remembered why she followed him. 

He wore his magic around him like a cloak of darkness and within his eyes the fire elemental shone like the flames of hell. Nothing could stand against him. Nothing could touch him, and she was drawn like a moth to his flame. She remembered why she had gone to Azkaban. She remembered why she would cheerfully die for him. He was the embodiment of everything Slytherin. He was indeed Salazar reborn. She wanted desperately to touch him, but she did not dare.

"Bellatrix," The Dark Lord said softly, and she disentangled herself from her family, turning slowly, her eyes locked on his, she sank to her knees in front of him. She knew she needed to tell him of her weakness before he touched her. If he touched her, he would know. He would be angry. A part of her didn't care. Even his crucio would be welcome after the years of famine in this dread place. 

"We were faithful, Master," she whispered, her voice rasping. "Rodolphus and I-Rodolphus?" She wanted to be regal and beautiful for him, but she was nothing. She was a beaten dirty criminal. The aurors had reduced her to this, and suddenly an old anger flared within her. She wanted them to die and now she was free. She could make them pay. "We were faithful," she whispered.

"I know," he said. "You and your husband were faithful, and great rewards will be yours." 

What greater reward she thought is there but being alive and in your presence.

"Rodolphus -is he alive?"

"He is alive."

She noticed that her Lord did not elaborate and she didn't push him. She would see Rodolphus soon enough. She had to tell the Dark Lord about the times she had failed to be faithful. Perhaps she should even tell him about cursing the rat by strangulation. NO, she shivered. She would try to keep that one secret, she thought. She used to be good at this sort of ward. Just keep one little memory secret from him. Keep telling yourself about all the other memories and don't give that particular one a thought. That was how to do it.

She would have spoken again, but he held up his hand for her silence. "Think of what reward you want to be yours," he said. "You do not have to tell me your wishes now. Think about it."

"I have thought about it my Lord. It is all I have thought about-" Her mind went immediately to Rookwood and her hands clenched wanting nothing more than to curse him this minute for all of his tortures but most of all for making her want the luxuries.

Her Dark Lord turned her palm upright in his own hand and traced the furrows there. "What happened here?" he asked, looking at the deep scars etched into her hands. There was such gentleness in his touch. She had never remembered him being gentle with anyone, certainly not with her, but she was not a woman who appreciated gentleness. It was strength she craved. 

"Sometimes when the dementers-" She thought about explaining, but their was no explanation. She decided to be blunt. It was better that way. "Sometimes, I failed." She said.

She licked her lips furtively, looking at the ground, expecting any minute to be punished. She would feel his magic, she thought with a rush, and then she remembered that even the great Dark Lord could not do magic here on Azkaban, but it would come. She would feel his wrath. She was not afraid. After so long without magic, she didn't care what form it took. Pain or joy or just a simple cooking spell would be heaven to her.

"I gave in to the despair," she said. "I thought you had abandoned us," There she had said it. She had told him that she didn't believe. It was better that the truth came straight from her mouth than to have him extract it from her head. She knew this much from experience. She kept nothing from him except perhaps the depth of her despair. The words came in a rush. " I knew such thoughts were dangerous. It was wrong-punishable-but I had no magic-No way to repair--my broken dreams-"

"I see," said Lord Voldemort, tracing the furrows with his own scarred finger and doing something so surprising, so totally unexpected, that she stared in disbelief. H e reached into his pocket and pulled out his own small jar of silvery ointment. He put two of his own fingers into the jar and pulled out a bit of it and spread it carefully on her hands. The scars disappeared immediately. Only phoenix ointment would do that and phoenix was unaccountably expensive and because it was from a "light" bird it was generally not even available at Knockturn. She knew what a gift he had given her, and she was amazed.

"You know now, if I could have come sooner, I would have." He said, his voice as soft as a lovers. She was completely undone. "It was as if he was apologizing—apologizing to her!" 

"Yes, Master," she said. Thinking anything he wanted of her—Anything. --in life or death—was his. 

He reached out to her and she leaned against his hand as he drew a finger down the side of her cheek. She felt his magic, just for her. His mouth creased into a smile as he caught the total devotion in her thoughts. "You are forgiven," he said, and Bellatrix breathed again..

Once his touch was withdrawn from her mind she felt bereft. Needy. It was not a feeling she was used to. He seemed to sense it, and would have spoken, but she pulled herself out of it. She had prepared for this day. She would stand proud. He smiled at her and then turned to greet the others. 

A man as great as he could not be bound. She had waited. She would continue to wait. Her time would come.

She needed to get a hold of herself. To remember who she was. Her eyes were drawn to the sea. The spray was cold off of the ocean, but the magic itself was the temperature she wanted it to be, without further thought she left her family and waded into the ocean to find herself. 

For just a moment she felt the frigid water and the she felt only magic. It was elusive and so far away, but it was there. Unlike Azkaban, the magic was here. She dug deep within herself using her will and her power to gain mastery over it and call it to herself. In a moment, she had it, water fell through her fingers and then she dragged a little more power out of the element finding the fire. The sound of the sparks hissing against the water was like a lullaby. She remembered Carman drowning her flames so often when she was a child, but no longer. Her control was impeccable.

""Mistress?"

She turned on it in fury. Flinging the hot magic in her hands upon it. How dare this elf interrupt her! "What is it, creature!" she snapped. Another part of her was amazed with the fact that she had house elves again. Loyal house elves would do her bidding as they did the bidding of countless generations of Blacks, and Doogles, and Lestranges.

"Kreature comes to take Mistress away from here. Mistress must go to the Snow Castle," he said, hesitantly holding out his hand. "Mistress must, touch Kreature.

"What is the meaning of this?" she thought, and her mother apparently sensing her confusion came forward. She wanted to hug her mother like she did her sons. It was not through sentimentality that she wanted to touch her. She wanted desperately to feel her magic. The deep, sweet taste she had felt from her son and Voldemort was not nearly enough. She felt like she had been starved for fourteen years and was desperate to make up for lost time. She wanted to dance around and beg someone to play _quit _with her. She nearly giggled at the thought, the magic she still held sparking and sizzling like a schoolgirl's magic.

"Bellatrix," said Carman. "The wards do not allow prisoners to leave. Your magical essence is recognized by the ward. The creature's magic will protect you. Isn't that what house elves do? Protect and serve their masters?"

"I have to touch it?" asked Bellatrix, showering sparks which blew in the wind and igniting briefly and then fizzling into nothingness on the barren rock of Azkaban. 

Narcissa moved forward. The ever-practical Narcissa would probably tell her to do a dying spell on her robe before she caught a cold.

Instead, Narcissa pulled a wand from her robe and handed it to her sister. "I was going to wait to give it to you," she said, brushing the sparks which were smoldering on her own robe. "But I think you need it already."

Bellatrix took the wand carefully, as if it were the last glass of water in a steaming desert. As she wrapped her hand around it, she smiled. "How can this be?" she said. "Mine was broken—Wait—it's Laurel's, isn't it?" 

"Yes," said Narcissa. "I had it shortened by an inch—"

Bellatrix turned waded back into the frigid water.

"Mistress?" The house elf was still waiting for Valeriana to touch it and apparate.

She looked at the house elf and then she looked around the shoreline. Her eyes were drawn back to the Dark Lord, busy in conference with some of his Death Eaters. He needed her, Bellatrix thought. She realized that she was not the only one with an abhorrence of touching house elves. A number of the freed Death Eaters and even some of those who had come willingly, were hesitant to touch the house elves.

Her Dark Lord didn't even realize there was a problem. She remembered what had made her indispensable to him now. She looked at the creature, some of her abhorrence disappearing. She would be indispensable again. She gathered the tiny remnants of magic around herself and stood a little taller. She remembered who she was. Bellatrix Black Lestrange. With a flourish, she raised her hands above her head. She didn't have the energy for the fire elemental to come and sizzle from her fingertips, but it didn't seem to matter. All eyes were on her. 

"I told you he would come for us!" She looked around at them accusing. Remembering all those who called her Loony Lestrange and told her to shut up. She would have her revenge, she promised herself, but not yet. Not here. 

"Today, He has come for us!"

Some of the freed Death Eaters turned to listen to her.

"He has come at last," she continued. "I will not fail him. Who is with me?" 

While all eyes were on her, she conquered her distaste, took several steps out of the water and turned to Kreature. 

Yes, she thought. She would go to the Snow Castle, and she would never be without magic again. Her eyes settled on the Dark Lord who had turned to watch her, a smile creasing his face. 

She spoke in a loud voice. "Take me where the Dark Lord wishes, creature," she said holding out her hand. Her eyes however, never left the blazing red eyes of the Dark Lord.

==


	3. Chapter 3

CHAPTER 3

Disclaimer: Voldemort and Bellatrix belong to JK Rowlings. Thanks JK

A shiver of magic and a violet glow touched the warded door. It was one of his Death Eaters seeking access to him. He sighed, thinking of his stone basilisks who would tell him exactly who was at the door and what their intentions were. Basilisk sentries that used to guard The Slytherin Manor before it was destroyed, the likes of which were only present in the Chamber now, and he no longer had the magic to create sentient stone. Damn Muggles and their interference! Perhaps when they were all gone from the land, the magic would regenerate itself. One could hope. With a thought and a wave of his hand, he released the wards on the door.

Bellatrix Lestrange stood on the threshold. "Master." She sank to her knees, her jet black hair streaked near the front with tiny bits of silver, fell about her face as she bowed her head. Azkaban had aged her, he thought. Her flesh, never particularly radiant like her sisters, now was a sallow grayish color, and her body, once strong and tempting, was now all angles and corners, but magic was the same. The magic never changed within her. He remembered when she was born, the last of Carman's children, the last and the best, he thought, motioning her into the room with him and moving Nagini off of his shoulder and onto the sofa next to him. Bellatrix walked slowly into the room to face him and knelt to kiss his robe. He laid his hand on her head like a blessing, remembering her as a precocious toddler.

Andromeda had been Carman's first child, left too often with house elves and Hufflepuffs while He and Carman planned the domination of the world. Big plans often left little details unfinished. Andromeda was one of those details. By the time Carman and her husband, Braen, realized what was happening, Andromeda was enamored of a Muggleborn. He and Carman had wanted to eliminate the little vermin. Braen disagreed.

"It's just a phase," Braen had insisted. "Andromeda will get over him."

But Andromeda didn't get over him. She married him, and then it was too late to eliminate him. Andromeda was pregnant with his child. Perhaps it would be a Squib, they had hoped, and then killing it would be no problem. Unfortunately, it was a little witch. They named her Nymphadora. Carman had better luck with her next two daughters. Barely a year apart were the two who looked so much like his Carman, the brains and the beauty, Laurel and Narcissa. Well, he had told Carman, who had been named for the goddess of chaos, "You didn't get your three sons, but you do have three daughters."

"Yes," she had laughed as little Andromeda escaped her house elf and tripped around her mother, trying to avoid her two younger sisters combined efforts to get her to play with them. "Darkness, Evil and Violence."

"Go and play," snapped Carman shoving Andromeda from behind her.

"They're too rough," complained Andromeda.

"They're Slytherins," said Carman. "As are you."

"I don't want to hurt them," Andromeda returned. Narcissa and Laurel, however, had no such compunction and regularly joined forces against their older sister.

"You're the oldest," said Carman. "Act like it."

But Andromeda had never been a leader. The leader was born as the youngest, Bellatrix. Bellatrix who knelt before him now, Bellatrix, who had taken every trick her older sisters ever knew and improved upon them and made them her own. Bellatrix, who was faithful to him for thirteen years in Azkaban.

Her dark eyes were darting about the room, searching as if she expected some enemy in hiding. He wondered, not for the first time, if Azkaban had unhinged her.

Choosing to go to Azkaban rather than renounce him? Perhaps, she was unhinged before she went to Azkaban. He certainly would have never done the same.

"Bellatrix," he said, and her focus came back to him.

"My lord."

"Sit and tell me your news." He indicated the chair opposite him.

She sat on the chair and put her hands on the armrests momentarily, but she jerked them away, as if she expected chains to erupt from them. When nothing happened and he silently awaited her report, she seemed to relax. "The Mulcibers have found the passwords to Amelia Bone's house," she said, but they are changed every four hours. They will have to gain them again, right before we go to retrieve Madam Bones.." As she spoke Bellatrix seemed to relax a little more, and her eyes stayed on him instead of darting to the shadows.

Voldemort nodded glad that he had replaced the Scrimgoers with the Mulicibers. The wonders of polyjuice still amazed him. It was all so simple. "The Minister of Magical Law is friends with the Scrimgoers, then?" he asked.

"Yes, my Lord. They have visited Madam Bones several times in the past few weeks. It shouldn't be a problem for them to get the passwords at any given time, but having only four hours will not allow them to babysit Moody."

"I see. I'll have to consider who will be best for that job," said Voldemort. "He wished Laurel was still alive. She would have been perfect for the job--or Barty Crouch-- "It's a great pity Barty Crouch is dead," he remarked to Bellatrix. "He and Moody thought so alike it was uncanny."

"Yes, Master," said Bellatrix hesitating.

"Is there something else?"

"No, Master." She looked down. Not at the shadows. Not at his face.

It was obvious to him that she was lying. "Come here."

She came a bit hesitantly and he stood, laying his hands upon her face, which was beginning to glow with a bit of color now. He wondered what it was that she, the most loyal of his loyal Death Eaters, was hiding from him. As he touched her, she hid nothing from him. Desire struck him full in the face. It was hot and insistent. She raised her smoky black eyes to his and parted her lips waiting.

"You should have a husband—" he began.

"I don't want a husband," Bellatrix sneered. "I _never_ wanted a husband. That was my parents doing. Not mine." Boldly she laid her fingers on the skin at his neck, letting the magic flow between them. "Tell me when to quit," she cooed like a giddy school girl, pressing her lips against the dry scales that mingled with human skin on his neck.

He hesitated, exploring the feelings coursing though him. Surprise mostly, that anyone would in any way desire what he called his body now. Surprise and regret that her magic, which should have felt wonderful, felt like bugs crawling on his skin. He had traded pleasure for power when he attained immortality and he felt no desire at all for her. The only feelings that moved him at all were those associated with death and pain.

"I want to feel—your magic," she whispered

He knew well what she wanted, but he was no longer capable of participating, and he was not magnanimous enough to give her pleasure without equal gain. He knew well what he was missing and regret twisted inside of him, as he caught her hands and pushed her roughly away. "Do you think I care what you want?" he growled.

"Then kill me now," she shouted, flinging her Laurel's borrowed wand to the ground and pacing away from him. "Do you think I waited all that time in Azkaban for a dream of wizard superiority? For Muggle killing and raids on Dumbledore and Aurors? Do you think I waited for that?"

Her outburst surprised him, excited him, angered him. She advanced on him as no other Death Eater would have, her black eyes flashing fire, and her angular body gaining some measure of grace with her emotion. "Go ahead then," she demanded, throwing her arms out to the side. "Kill me now. I have nothing left to live for." She threw her head back, dark eyes flashing, her red lips pulled back in a sneer. He never thought her so beautiful, so full of life.

He grabbed her hair and pushed her against the wall. "Be careful what you wish for, Bellatrix," he said in a threatening hiss. "I could just as easily use _Crucio_ as _Avada_."

"Do it then!" she said in a low voice. "After thirteen years without magic, there is nothing you can do to me that scares me. Nothing. The Dementors have done it all already." Her black eyes challenged him and mocked him and beckoned him. He wanted to protect her from the Dementors, to kiss her, to make her bend to his will. He wanted so much more than his snake body would give him.

He wrapped his hands more tightly in her hair and placed his fingers against her throat. He felt the bravado starting to slip from her and he smiled. **"Crucio!"** he said.

Through his touch, he felt the hot smoke of his _crucio_ curse fill her lungs and in her mind she screeched with pain, but there was no breath with which to scream. She struggled for a moment to breathe, before she expertly switched to breathing magic. He felt her make the switch, and held his breath himself in concert with her for a moment and then drew heavily on the Air Elemental. Her body quivered with the fear of death. Regardless to what she said, she was afraid. He felt the fear through the Legilimency. Fear, primal and stark within her, and the magic laced with pain and fear excited him like nothing else she could have done. He tightened his hands around her as she struggled against the pain and fear, both increasing until he felt her suddenly go limp in his arms and he released the _Crucio_, burying his face in her hair, and releasing to the Air Elemental several shuddering breaths.

Voldemort re-warded the door and sat, holding her in the darkening room. He shifted her in his arms and pulled the container of Phoenix ointment from his robe. He rubbed the last dregs of the potion from the container, and shared it between his scarred and burning palms. He would have to tell Snape he needed more. His basilisks, confused and wary of the heightened emotion and smell of burnt flesh, stirred uncomfortably, hissing and tasting the air.

"Hisssuss? Prey?" one asked, confused.

"Not hisssuss," answered Voldemort, "Not this one. She is not my prey, but she is part of my power nonetheless."

Nagini moved close to his warmth, saying nothing.

"She knows I didn't feel her magic," Voldemort hissed softly to Nagini, but still Nagini said nothing, and, at last, Bellatrix drew a long breath into her lungs and opened her eyes. She seemed surprised to find herself held in the Dark Lord's arms and she struggled to a sitting position. A wrack of coughing assaulted her, and, eyes watering, she looked at him, her huge dark eyes full of questions.

He said nothing, only touched her face with a long finger. He dragged it down from the corner of her cheekbone to her chin, with unaccustomed gentleness, waiting for the thoughts to come, willing them to come. He was not disappointed, although he sensed that she was trying to hide these from him.

"_He is as empty as I am,_" she thought. "_Feeling nothing but the strongest emotions, death and fear and pain—_" Pity. She pitied him. He clenched his fists. He would not have her pity. He would rather have her hate.

"I have a task for you, Bellatrix," he said flatly. "Since your lack of a husband seems to have turned you into a slut." He felt the pity immediately disappear from her thoughts, replaced by a simmering anger and he met her cold dark eyes. "I want you to seduce Severus Snape."

She gaped at him open mouthed, and he traced a finger around her lips, sensing the anger in her thoughts. They were clear as a shout, "_Go to hell!_"

She wouldn't, of course, say the words out loud, but she knew he would sense them. "I'm already there," he said softly, "The question is, Bellatrix, whether or not you are going to come with me—"

He remembered her saying that when she received her Dark Mark. "I'll follow you to hell and back, My Lord—" That's what she had said-- with the Mark burning black on her skin-- she hadn't shed a tear. Grown wizards were reduced to screaming, but she was dry eyed, clenching the magic in her fists, her eyes as black as the Mark, boring into him. She was magnificent. He admired her above all the other Death Eaters, but he couldn't give her what she wanted--what He wanted--because he had traded it for his immortality, and at this moment He wondered if it wasn't His loss.

Bellatrix stood to go without asking permission and he caught her shoulder. Nagini hissed angrily at the sudden movement. "And," he said softly, "you can return to me tomorrow." He smiled thinly. "I rather enjoyed our little session, Bellatrix."

She pulled out of his grasp and stalked to the door. Her back was straight and unyielding. No that was wrong. She had yielded. She had always yielded to him. He watched as she moved, like a dangerous predator, her robe rippling as she walked. Unbeknownst to her, his red eyes softened as he watched her go. He wondered if he should summon her back just to make a point, but, in the end, he let her go. After all, he wanted her loyalty. That was all he was likely to get.

Silently He petted Nagini. The serpent's cold scales were no substitute for Bellatrix's hot skin and hotter magic.

(A/N: This chapter is a portion of THE SEERS TRUTH: BEYOND THE DARKNESS. Read the fic in its entirety on --Lady Lestrange)


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